RESURRECTION IN THE HERE AND NOW

I received an e-mail from a pastor who had quit his church. This poor man had fallen into deep sin and lost his wife and children. His whole life fell apart and he found himself staring at death.

In his darkest hour, he fell on his knees and cried for help. Jesus came to this broken, desperate man and breathed new life into him. Soon afterward, the man’s wife called him, saying, “I miss Jesus. Can we try again?”

Today that pastor works in one of our drug rehabilitation centers. Consider Ephesians 2:1–3: “And you [the Lord] made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins... you once walked according to the course of this world… among whom also we all once conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath.”

Perhaps this describes your experience. Before you knew the Lord, you were doing your own thing. You were caught up in the spirit of the times, trying every sin and pleasure. You thought you would “put God off” until later. You believed your good works and donations would save you.

Then the Lord came to you. “But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), and raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Ephesians 2:4–6).

Beloved, this is all about getting new life, which can be found only in Christ. Paul is not talking here about the final resurrection. He is describing what God does on earth — resurrection in the here and now!